


Shining Like Silver

by mariecontrary



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Dumbledore's Army, Female Friendship, Gen, Male-Female Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-14
Updated: 2017-12-01
Packaged: 2018-12-15 09:17:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,246
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11803071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mariecontrary/pseuds/mariecontrary
Summary: Adventures of the silver trio and friends at Hogwarts during book 7. Many thanks to luluwriter for beta'ing.





	1. Three Friends on a Train

Platform 9 ¾ looked just the way it always had. There were the same bricks, here were the same magical entrances, and across the way were the same benches. The train sat in its usual place, waiting expectantly to be boarded by students and whisk them off to another year of school. Only the crowd had changed.  
Neville walked with his Gran and searched the crowd for a friendly face as he pushed his trolley, just like he always did. Yet as hard as he tried, he couldn’t find Harry, Dean, Ron, or Hermione. It’s not like he thought he would, after certain recent Ministry decrees, and yet his eyes kept roaming of their own volition. Looking around, it seemed like at least a third of the usual hoard of students and parents had suddenly disappeared, leaving strange, empty patches of space in a place that was usually packed to the absolute brim.  
“It might be Kurples, you know.”  
The light ethereal voice sounded just behind Neville’s left ear, and he spun abruptly on one foot to find its owner. As expected, Luna stood about six inches away, complete with her customary dreamy expression and radish earrings.  
“What’s a Kurple?” Neville asked, by way of hello.  
“They make your eyes spin and dance, of course. Yours kept jumping around.” Luna said this, as always, with a tone of utmost seriousness. Neville couldn’t help smiling in response.  
“Who is this?” Gran’s voice cut in sharply, making Neville jump. He’d almost forgotten she was there, which was quite a feat considering her hat contained not one but three different types of waterfowl. It’s hard to forget about someone who’s gazing primly at you from underneath several pounds of feathers.  
“This is Luna, she’s in sixth year. Luna, this is my Gran.” Neville gestured awkwardly and hoped Gran wouldn’t comment on Luna’s fashion choices.  
“Pleased to meet you,” Luna responded demurely. “I like your hat.”  
Gran puffed up a little at this. “Thank you, dear, it’s quite a masterpiece, isn’t it?”  
“It’d be very good for attracting Pilirisms, they’re fond of dead birds.” Luna’s eyes slid gently away as though unconcerned about receiving a response, and Gran’s threatened to pop out of her head.  
“I beg your pardon?”  
“C’mon Luna, let’s go find a compartment,” Neville interjected quickly, ushering her away towards the train. He turned back to say his goodbyes and found Gran with a strange look on her face that had nothing to do with his friend’s peculiarities.  
“Everything alright, Gran?” Getting no response, Neville followed her gaze down the platform, but couldn’t tell what she was looking at.  
“Yes of course,” Gran replied, tearing her eyes away from whatever it was. “Have a good term, and apply yourself to your studies.”  
Neville refrained from sighing, if only by the skin of his teeth. “Bye, Gran.” He turned to follow Luna, and just caught a glimpse of her climbing into a car. He hurried to catch up, and dragged his trunk in behind her.  
“Well of course, Luna, but I still think- oh hi, Neville!” Ginny sat cross-legged on the bench and seemed to be in the middle of an earnest discussion with Luna, as though they had been conversing for several hours instead of approximately thirty seconds.  
Neville said hello and settled in to the compartment, gazing out the window and letting their intent discussion wash over him as the train pulled away from the platform. It was odd, wasn’t it, how everything outside could be so different, so scary and dark, and the company of good friends could remain as comforting as ever. It seemed there was a silent agreement not to discuss anything more important than their current game of exploding snap or the magical creatures Luna had recently been studying that may or may not actually exist. The specter of the real world hung outside the window, of political corruption, mysterious disappearances, and terrible rumors, but after all, they were only sixteen, weren’t they? Surely they could spend at least a few hours away from all of that. Whoever Gran had seen getting on the train completely vanished from Neville’s mind. Those mysterious hooded figures lurked nearby, but Neville remained entirely unaware. Night fell and the train sped closer and closer to Hogwarts and to the next year of their lives.


	2. The Great Feast

The train pulled into the Hogwarts platform with a loud whistle, and the mob of students in black robes and hats flowed out of it. Across the way the familiar shout of “Firs’ years! Firs’ years over here!” could be heard, and Hagrid could be seen towering several feet above a small group of eleven-year-olds. Luna, Neville, and Ginny made their way towards one of the carriages, Luna taking a small detour to visit with the thestral harnessed to it. She let it sniff her hand and patted it gently. Turning back to look at her friends, Luna found Neville clambering into his seat, unconcerned, and Ginny with her brows furrowed together, as though it would stop appearing to her that Luna was cooing to thin air if she only concentrated hard enough.  
Once in the carriage they were joined by Seamus, who sat next to Neville, looking grim.   
“Er, hello Seamus,” Ginny offered, somewhat apprehensively. “Have a good summer?”  
The look Seamus gave her could have cut glass. “Not particularly, no. Didn’t think I’d ever have to take this bloody trip without Dean, did I? Never thought that he’d have to go on the run because he doesn’t know if his prat father was a wizard or not, on account of how the poor bugger up and died before he was born.”  
There it was then, the elephant in the carriage that they’d all been avoiding. The Ministry had decreed that all Muggleborns be “registered” and that every student had to have their blood status verified before they could attend Hogwarts. Unfortunately for Dean, with a Muggle mother and a father he had no records of, this meant he couldn’t come back to Hogwarts. It also meant he couldn’t show his face in the magic world, or else he’d be arrested. Nothing puts a damper on your last year of school like your best mate not being there because he’s dodging the government who want to jail him for no good reason. Ginny could relate.  
An awkward silence settled on the four of them as the thestrals jolted forwards, apparently at an entire loss for what to say in this situation. They hadn’t exactly had much practice, Luna mused, and perhaps that was for the best.   
“S’pose it’s just you and me then?” Seamus asked Neville. “I mean, I can’t imagine Undesirable Number One and his best mate are gonna be sharing our dormitory this year, and with Dean gone that just leaves us.”  
“S’pose it is then,” Neville replied. “Ginny, do you know what they’re doing out there? I mean Harry, Ron, and Hermione, do you know what they’re up to?”  
Ginny just shrugged. Seamus scoffed, “Hiding like the rest of the wanted list, I ‘spect.”  
Neville frowned. “Nah, I bet they’re doing something. Fighting You-Know-Who, somehow.”  
“How, then?” Seamus demanded, but Neville had no answer and Ginny had suddenly become very intrigued by her own shoelaces.  
The carriages pulled up to the school, and the three Gryffindors bid Luna goodbye as they headed into the Great Hall, towards their respective House tables. Luna settled onto a bench near the other sixth-year Ravenclaws. A few gave polite nods, but otherwise her presence went largely unnoticed. Amidst the usual cacophony of several hundred teenagers excited to see each other again, Luna looked around.  
At the front of the room, Snape sat in the Headmaster’s golden chair in the center of the staff table. Flanking him on either side were Alecto and Amycus Carrow. Luna recognized them from the Daily Prophet article announcing their appointment as professors at Hogwarts. Of course a few years ago, they had been in the Prophet as wanted criminals, but the newspaper appeared to be conveniently ignoring that. Professor McGonagall had been displaced from her position at the Headmaster’s right side as well as from her position as Deputy Headmistress; both had been taken by Alecto Carrow. Hagrid sat, as always, on the far right end of the table, nearest to Gryffindor House, and Slughorn took the opposite position by Slytherin.  
Snape rose from his chair slowly, calling the room to order with a magically magnified tap on his glass, just like Dumbledore always did.  
“Before we begin, there are a few… announcements.” Snape’s voice was cold and distant. “Our new Deputy Headmistress would like to say a few words.” Snape sat down rather abruptly, as though the Headmaster’s routine duty of giving announcements about things like Quidditch teams was entirely beyond him. Alecto Carrow stood.  
“Starting now, all students will have to take Muggle Studies.”  
There was a general muttering around the hall as students made eye contact with the people around them. Muggle Studies? Of all things two known Death Eaters could make compulsory for them?  
“Before now, students have not learned enough about Muggles, or how dangerous they are to the Wizarding World. This must be fixed. Defense Against the Dark Arts will also be changing. The Dark Arts are not to be feared, but to be understood. I’m sure all of you will learn that by the end of the year.”  
There it was then, Luna thought. A few seats down, Cho swore under her breath, and called Alecto Carrow a word that made Terry Boot’s ears turn red and Padma Patil snort into her goblet.  
“Also, my brother Amycus Carrow and I will now be in charge of all discipline at Hogwarts.” Alecto sat down and the hall erupted into conversation. Two tables down, Luna could see Neville’s face had frozen into place. Closer to her, Michael Corner was gripping the edge of the tablecloth as though he’d float away if he didn’t.  
Luna couldn’t say that she blamed him, as she fussed with her earrings so she didn’t have to keep her hands still. Violent bigoted murderers were now in charge of punishing young children. What could possibly go wrong?


	3. Pond Scum

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which our heroes hatch a plan.

The fire in the Gryffindor common room crackled and spit, slowly dying down to a few red licks of flame. The chill wrapped around the castle seemed to leak into the room, spitting on the little burning log like a challenge, like it wanted to snuff it out. The two students still awake remained still in their chairs as the room grew darker, staring into the middle distance.  
“We need Dumbledore’s Army.”  
It was Ginny who spoke into the silence, breaking the quiet darkness with the sudden force of her words. Neville blinked, finally tearing his gaze away from the shifting, glowing coals half covered with ash. He looked at Ginny, but still didn’t speak.  
“It worked before, remember?” Ginny continued. “This is what we do when bloody evil teachers take control of Hogwarts and think they can get away with it. We have to find a way to fight back, and this is it.”  
Neville gave a small, determined nod. “We need Dumbledore’s Army.”  
Ginny grinned. “I bet you those sniveling cowards are still afraid of him, dead and all. That’s why we named it that, cause the Ministry were so afraid he’d corrupt our precious minds. Stupid gits, he raised an army after all, didn’t he? We just formed it ourselves.”  
“I think you’re right, but can we do it without them, though?” Neville asked, eyebrows furrowing. “It wasn’t really us before, Hermione ran it and Harry taught all the Defense stuff. I’ve gotten better, but neither of us are as good at it as they were.”  
“I dunno, I don’t think that’s what matters,” Ginny replied with a shrug. “We need to resist, don’t we? We can do that.”  
Neville had slowly begun to unfurl from his tightly fixed position on the couch, relaxing his limbs in little increments. He sat forward, leaning on his knees. “Do you still have your fake Galleon? The ones Hermione enchanted so we could pass secret messages?”  
“I reckon so,” said Ginny. “It’ll be in my trunk somewhere. Do you?”  
“I know exactly where mine is,” Neville said with just the slightest flush. “You- I mean, you know how much I liked the DA. I loved being really a part of something, for once. And I never learned anything as well as I did when Harry was teaching us Defense. Course I kept it. In case we ever got to do anything like that again- I mean, in case we needed to.”  
Ginny nodded. “We should get all the old DA people back into it, I bet most of them would be thrilled. I’ll talk to Luna in Charms tomorrow; I know she’ll want to help. We’ll talk to everyone who was in it before first, and then see who else we can bring in. Merlin knows we don’t want a repeat of last time, so we’ll have to be careful.”  
Neville was starting to get excited now; the light had come back into his eyes. “What’ll we do, though? It’s not exactly like last time, where we just wanted to pass our OWLs. There’s Death Eaters in charge now, and I hope to Merlin they don’t turn out worse than Umbridge but I wouldn’t be surprised either.”  
“Well we can still teach defense,” Ginny mused. “Don’t forget, we might not be Harry but we’ve fought alongside him, we can hold our own. Somehow I think we’ll all be needing the practice soon enough anyway. Besides that, we can give ‘em hell.”  
Neville cocked his head to the side. “Hell like Weasley’s fireworks, maybe?”  
“Exactly like that,” Ginny cackled. “I reckon we can take the Fred and George route here, as it were. Wouldn’t you like to see Snape stuck in a portable swamp? Bet some pond scum would wipe the smirk right off his greasy face.”  
“What kind of face d’ya think Alecto would make if we turned her brother into a bright yellow canary?”  
“Or if her whole class suddenly started vomiting all over their ridiculous Muggle Studies textbooks, cos it’s such a load of gag-worthy tripe?”  
Neville beamed at this. “Dumbledore’s Army, now recruiting.”  
“Guess we’d better start recruiting, then,” Ginny said with a devilish smile.  
“I’ll talk to Seamus in the morning,” Neville said, struggling to stifle a yawn.  
“Right,” Ginny replied, “in the morning.”  
Despite reassuring Neville that mounting a revolution could wait until the next day, Ginny didn’t sleep much. Her brain was whirring with thoughts of Dumbledore’s Army, with all the trouble they could give the Carrows. Somewhere, in the back of her mind, a little nagging voice whispered “Don’t forget all the trouble they could give you.”  
Ginny’s mind jumped from worry to worry. Sometimes it landed on fear of what a Death Eater in charge of discipline would be willing to do, sometimes on anger at how Snape could just stand there after stabbing Dumbledore in the back and betraying them all, sometimes on wondering how much they could get away with, before they landed themselves in real trouble with the Death Eaters and their horrifying master.  
Sometime before sunrise, it settled on a certain green-eyed boy and his companions. Were they safe out there? Well of course they weren’t, but would they at least stay out of too much danger? Knowing the three of them, the odds weren’t good. A memory floated into Ginny’s mind, summer sunlight and a single kiss, the silver lining she’d been looking for. Because of course, it had been something for her to take with her as well. It was something to fight for, wasn’t it? She let the memory wrap around her like a caress, and with the golden glow of that morning behind her eyes, Ginny finally drifted off to sleep.


	4. Recruiting Shenanigans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which our heroes raise an army.

The next morning, before breakfast, Ginny caught Luna’s arm in the hallway outside the Great Hall.  
“Luna,” Ginny whispered urgently, “I need to talk to you. We have to-”  
“Reform the D.A.,” Luna finished smoothly, in a quiet but calm tone. “Yes, we need to, don’t we?”  
Ginny quietly marveled, as she always did, at the way Luna occasionally plucked Ginny’s thoughts right out of her head. It was made all the more surprising by how oblivious and out of touch Luna often seemed.  
“Right,” Ginny replied, still a bit bemused. “Ask the rest of the Ravenclaws who were in it before, will you? Cho, Michael, Terry, all of those.”  
Luna nodded and they turned towards their respective House tables, melting away into the crowd of students.  
That very night most of the old D.A. sat on the floor of the Room of Requirement. Besides the conspicuous absence of its three founders and everyone being two years older, it might have been a meeting from its original run. The room was set up as the same classroom Harry had once asked it to be, complete with cushions and textbooks. Somehow Ginny guessed that it wouldn’t stay that way for long: what they needed to learn defensive magic probably wasn’t exactly what they needed for this particular fight. For right now, she appreciated the comfort and nostalgia the old space had.  
It was like nobody was quite certain how to get started without a Hermione to take charge and start bossing everyone around. Funny how you never appreciate that sort of thing until it’s gone, Ginny mused. Figuring nobody else would, Ginny stood up.  
“Hey, everyone. So I’m pretty sure we all know why we’re here. The question is, what are we going to do about it?”  
The room erupted. Cho Chang and Michael Corner immediately devolved into a shouting match, while Padma and Parvati Patil appeared to be agreeing entirely but still managed to be very loud and angry. Ernie Macmillan, Hannah Abbott, and Justin Finch-Fletchly were muttering intently to one another, while Terry Boot was gesturing wildly at Lavender Brown and Seamus Finnigan.  
Neville, Luna, and Ginny all looked at one another silently; a tiny calm in the middle of a storm, and Ginny could tell that they were all thinking the same thing. Now that they had their army, how to corral them? How could they actually accomplish anything useful, instead of just being a group of angry teenagers sitting on couches complaining about their teachers?  
Neville stood, glancing nervously at Ginny and Luna. Ginny understood immediately, and shouted “Oi! Everyone listen up!”  
Neville gave her a look that clearly meant “thank you,” and then cleared his throat. “Er, we need to give them a bit of trouble, right? Need to show the Carrows that they can’t just give us their crap propaganda about Muggles and pure blood and expect us to lie down and take it. This is our school, and we intend to keep it. Or at least to make their lives as miserable as possible.”  
There was a general murmuring of assent. Luna rose to her feet. “We should tell them that. Something for them to wake up to.”  
Ginny grinned at her and leapt up to join her two friends at the front of the room. “I’ve got something that might work. Bit of a present from my older brothers, it’s a paint that can’t be cleaned up or washed away, not with any spells either.”  
There was a round of laughter from the gathered students. Cho was grinning as well now, and Ernie was suggesting various grossly anatomical phrases that could be scrawled on the Carrows’ office doors.  
The next morning at breakfast, many students were surprised to discover that the staff table had mysteriously changed overnight. It had been flipped over so that its flat surface faced the rest of the hall. The banners on it had been ripped down and discarded on the floor. In large red letters, the table now read “DUMBLEDORE’S ARMY: NOW RECRUITING.”


	5. More Shenanigans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we earn that canon-typical violence tag.

By Halloween, there was scarcely a place in school that hadn’t been graced by the phrase. Neville tried to pay attention to his schoolwork, but besides Herbology, Dumbledore’s Army felt more important than everything else. A few days before the Halloween celebrations, the D.A. was gathered in the Room of Requirement, as they did so often these days. It had less the look of a classroom now, and was more like a cross between a clubhouse and a storeroom: the perfect place to plan revolutions.   
“Alright, let’s get started,” said Ginny. “We need to do something big for Halloween, really screw up the festivities. Anybody got any suggestions?”   
“I’ve got something,” offered Ernie. “It’ll be a lot of work, but I reckon we can pull it off.”  
Neville listened to Ernie’s plan intently, raising his eyebrows at the trickier bits. It might just be crazy enough to work, and if it did, it would surely go down in history with the likes of the Weasley twins’ epic exit. They just had to make sure that nothing went wrong.   
The morning of Halloween, they all woke up to an interesting announcement: The Quibbler had been banned on the grounds that it supported dangerous criminal Undesirable Number One, also known as Harry Potter.  
“Bit déjà vu, this, innit?” Seamus said at breakfast, chomping on a piece of bacon. “It’s Umbridge all over again, banning the one magazine that supports Harry Potter.”  
“Yeah, well let’s just hope we can run these ones out as well,” Neville replied.  
“The Defense position’s still cursed, far as we know. That should help get rid of one of them at least,” Padma pointed out.   
Seamus grinned at this. “Guess we better focus on the other one, then. Although it can’t hurt to help the curse along a bit, can it?”  
This evoked a few chuckles from their group, but Neville didn’t laugh, still preoccupied with the plan for that night and whether or not they’d be able to get away with it.  
~~~~~~~~  
“Too slow,” Amycus Carrow sneered, his looming figure cutting the trio off from the stairs that led up to the towers, and safety. Alecto caught up behind them, blocking any chance of escape. Neville’s heart was thumping, they’d been caught red-handed, and there was no way to get out of it this time.   
“You,” Alecto snarled, pointing her wand directly at Neville’s chest. “You’re the one that’s been behind all of this, the one that’s been causing so much trouble.”  
“It’s not just him, it’s us too-”  
“Quiet!” Alecto whipped around, and hit Ginny with a Silencing charm, cutting off her protests. “You’re the mastermind,” she continued, looking back towards Neville. “So it’s you who’s in the most trouble. Crucio!”  
Neville was taken aback and hardly had time to realize what had just happened before he dropped to the ground like a stone. Luna screamed and Ginny gasped like a landed fish, unable to make sound, but Neville was unaware of them, unaware of anything but the pain. This was agony, it was unbearable, if it lasted any longer he would surely lose consciousness, but it didn’t end, wouldn’t end, please just let it end-  
“Carrow!”  
Mcgonagall’s voice rang through the hallway, and Neville had never been so glad to hear it. He collapsed to the floor, unable to move, unspeakably grateful that Mcgonagall had broken Alecto’s concentration.  
“What do you think you’re doing?!”  
“My job, Mcgonagall, and if you think you can stop me-”  
“What is going on here?” A cold, thin voice cut through the cacophony above Neville’s limp form.  
“Headmaster, we caught these kids, it’s them what have been causing all the trouble lately.”  
“Then they must certainly be punished,” Snape responded in that icy voice that betrayed nothing of what he was thinking.  
“Severus,” Mcgonagall spat, “if you intend to let these people torture my students-”  
“Be quiet, you old bat!” Amycus sneered. “Alecto, let’s take them to the dungeons and-”  
“Silence, all of you,” Snape cut in. “You three, you will have detention in the Forbidden Forest with Hagrid for the next week. If you manage not to get eaten alive in there, I’m certain you will have learned your lesson.”  
Amycus and Alecto grinned evilly at the prospect of students being eaten alive, but Neville was weak with relief, recognizing Snape’s intervention as the reprieve it was. Snape ordered them all to bed, and Mcgonagall offered to escort them. Snape nodded at this and strode away, the Carrows following close behind him. As soon as they were out of sight, Mcgonagall rushed over and undid the Silencing charm on Ginny.  
“Neville, are you alright?” It was Luna’s voice. Neville tried to nod in response, and suddenly realized that he was sobbing and wasn’t sure when he’d started. His parents, his poor parents, how much more of that had they gone through? Minutes? Hours? And Neville had been begging for unconsciousness after only a few seconds. How could they have endured that, how could they have taken that without breaking?  
“You must be more careful,” Mcgonagall said with quiet, deadly seriousness, interrupting Neville’s train of thought. “You mustn’t rely on the other teachers to protect you, we can only do so much.”   
Luna and Ginny were there now, asking if he was alright, could he stand, will he make it. Leaning on both of their shoulders, Neville muscled himself to his feet and looked Mcgonagall in the eye.  
“We won’t expect you to, then.”  
Mcgonagall swallowed hard. “Ms. Lovegood, Ms. Weasley, help me get Mr. Longbottom to the hospital wing, please.”  
Ginny and Luna muttered their assent and headed towards the infirmary, pulling Neville with them.


	6. The Christmas Train

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the silver trio boards the train home for the Christmas holidays.

Neville spent a few days in the hospital wing, after which he was completely recovered, at least physically. The whole incident killed the D.A.’s drive to cause a large ruckus, and after the trio’s detentions with Hagrid passed without any trouble, they weren’t too eager to go looking for more. November passed and December arrived quickly, bringing with it snow, wind, and the kind of excitement for the holidays that can only be found when children are away from home for several months beforehand. Seamus still managed to find time to come up with a new way to sneak Dungbombs into Alecto Carrow’s office, and copies of the newly re-banned Quibbler were surreptitiously circulated throughout the Houses; otherwise it was a quiet month. Muggle Studies remained full of prejudicial garbage, but since nobody committed any large infractions, the dungeons stayed empty for the time being.  
Luna stood in her dormitory, packing for her trip home. It had been good to have Dumbledore’s Army again, but she had still had a few long, strange, stressful months. She was looking forward to seeing her father again, to getting to help him with issues of The Quibbler, and working on his recreation of the diadem of Ravenclaw. Maybe she could decorate her room some more, and go fishing for fresh-water Plimpies. Luna made her way down the stairs of Ravenclaw Tower, following the current of students headed out toward the train home. Luna spotted Ginny and Neville standing on the platform chatting with Seamus and Ernie. Ginny caught Luna’s eye and waved her over towards them.  
The five of them piled into a compartment, chatting excitedly in hushed voices about their plans for the D.A. when they got back, and talking more loudly about their plans for the holiday. The train ride flew by, a blur of sweets and card games and comfortable silences. Ginny and Luna lounged on the bench watching while Neville sat on the floor with some plant or other, Luna wasn’t sure what kind. Whatever it was, he was completely absorbed in trimming it, and seemed completely and utterly content. Ernie and Seamus played Exploding Snap in the corner. As the train got closer and closer to Platform 9 ¾, the air grew full of impatient anticipation, everyone feeling very ready to get out of the compartment and go home. King’s Cross approached in the distance, and everyone stood up, stretching and gathering their things.  
The small crowd of redheads standing by one of the pillars was unmistakable. Ginny swung her bag over her shoulder, wished them all a happy Christmas, and strode off in that direction. Neville found his grandmother in the crowd, or more accurately, his grandmother’s hat. He hesitated, seeing that Luna was still stuffing copies of The Quibbler into her bag.  
“Go on, have a happy Christmas,” Luna said, waving him out. “Don’t forget to check your tree for Druzies!”  
Neville smiled. “Happy Christmas, Luna.”  
He headed out the door, and Luna was just about to follow him when she noticed one more magazine had mysteriously made its way underneath the bench. She crawled under to grab it, and that’s when she heard a loud crack. And then another, and one more, and then Luna felt a hand on her shoulder, and whipped around to see a hooded masked figure, three of them, and three wands pointed directly at her. She tried to throw the closest one’s hand off her shoulder and made a wild grab for her wand with her left hand, bellowing “NEVILLE! DEATH EATERS, NEVILLE-”  
A bolt of red light came out of the wand from about two inches away, but Luna shoved the Death Eaters’ hand out of the way and it missed, crashing into a bench cushion instead. Luna flung her hand upward into the Death Eaters throat; whacking them in the windpipe and making them cough and splutter. Luna’s fingers fumbled on her wand inside of her robe pocket, finally getting a hold of it, but the other two had recovered from their surprise and sent two more Stunning spells at her just as Neville thundered into the compartment, wand at the ready.  
Luna crumpled to the floor unconscious, as Neville screamed “No! Luna!” and starting throwing curses at the hooded figures. All three of them returned fire and Neville had to leap behind the door to avoid them. The first Death Eater, who was apparently in charge, shouted “let’s go!” Neville kept sending curses, shouting desperately, but it was too late. The three attackers grabbed Luna and each other, and with another loud crack, all of them vanished into thin air.   
Neville sank to the ground as Ginny ran in behind him, followed by Mr. and Mrs. Weasley.   
“Neville,” Ginny gasped, “What happened? Where’s Luna?”  
“Gone,” Neville croaked. “Death Eaters, three of them, they grabbed her, we couldn’t stop them-”  
Ginny swore loudly, and everyone’s face took on a mask of pure horror. Neville stared at the space where Luna had just been, as though unable to comprehend that she was no longer there.   
“But- why?” It was Mr. Weasley. “Why would they-?”  
“It was her father,” Ginny managed. “He’s been speaking out against them and the Ministry in his magazine, the Carrows didn’t like it, they banned it from the school.”  
“What’s going to happen to her?” Neville was distraught, clearly a hair’s breadth away from panic. “Where have they taken her, what are they going to do?”  
A new voice rose up from behind the Weasleys. “Where’s my Luna?” It was Xenophilius Lovegood. Neville and Ginny looked at each other, unable to make eye contact with the distressed man pleading for answers they did not have.  
“Please, where is she, what’s happened to my daughter?”


End file.
